


Upshots of Villainy and Genetic Anomalies

by cyndrarae



Category: Dark Angel
Genre: M/M, Post-Series, bottom!Logan
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-12-26
Updated: 2011-12-26
Packaged: 2017-10-28 04:40:12
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,444
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/303823
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cyndrarae/pseuds/cyndrarae
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Written for a prompt: “Alec goes into heat while caught by White. White is oh so helpful when he tosses in Logan.”</p>
            </blockquote>





	Upshots of Villainy and Genetic Anomalies

**Author's Note:**

> Warnings: dub-con, m/m slash, possible rape triggers

***

“Someone muzzle that freak. I’m getting a fucking migraine.” Ames White rubbed his temple and pointed a sharp look at his right-hand man.

Gottlieb gulped and turned to the five men standing guard outside the cage holding their latest acquisition – an X5.

Three of them blinked and looked away. Two pretended they didn’t hear White at all. White rolled his eyes. _Ordinaries_.

The transgenic let loose another string of expletives and rammed the bars again, making the guards jump. Even White started, just a little. Not that anyone saw it, of course.

“D-don’t make us tazer you again, 494,” Gottlieb threatened, standing his ground, at least attempting to.

“I’d like to see you try,” retorted a deep baritone voice emerging from the cell’s dark shadows.

X5-494 leaned against the bars with his long legs crossed at the ankles. It wasn’t the stance of someone scared or intimidated. It was the stance of someone very, _very_ pissed and predatory, like somehow he wasn’t the one in the cage.

“Come on in then, Otto…” he goaded, looking right at Gottlieb, “… _darling_.”

White watched bemusedly as Gottlieb fought the sudden urge to pull his tie off, no doubt starting to get hot around the collar. The guards shifted too, feeling a strange mix of attraction and revulsion they couldn’t explain.

But White could.

In the dim light of the underground brig, the X5 looked paler, almost sickly. The muscled chest heaved with exertion. White could hear his mutant heart thundering away like that of a racehorse. The grey wife-beater and black camouflage pants stuck to his body soaked in sweat. Drops of perspiration glistened all over the flushed face and neck, as also on the rippling biceps of his arms.

But the eyes… the eyes glinted with a dangerous, crazed intensity that made every human in the vicinity inexplicably uncomfortable.

White was the only one who stood unperturbed. “Ah, that time of the year, I see…”

494 visibly tensed, his jaw set harder than before. White smirked, his expression filled with equal parts amusement and disgust. “Gotta hand it to my old man, Otto – he sure had a perverse sense of humor.”

He approached the cage, feeling the subtle change in his own body temperature but it didn’t sway him like the rest of them. He was a superior being, after all.

“Anything we can do to help with this little _problem_ of yours?”

494 glared coldly but didn’t react.

“Okay. I know what you need. And you know what _I_ need.” White stepped closer. “Coordinates for Sandeman. Max found him, didn’t she?”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“You help me find my father, freak, and I help you live – simple as that. You have… how long has it been now, exactly?”

White looked at his watch and back up at the transgenic. He spotted a slight tremor in 494’s right hand and smiled. It’d been sixteen hours since the raid that led to two very successful captures: one too selfless to save himself; another too stupid to not leave the first guy behind.

“It's a lucrative deal…” he said, nodding towards the youngest of the five guards waiting outside. “What do you say?”

494 hardly glanced at the soldier being offered up as his reward for treason. “Sorry, not my type.”

White shrugged, ready to bide his time. “Your funeral.”

He stalked off, Gottlieb rushing after him, and 494 shrank back into the shadows once again.

“Sir?” Gottlieb voiced his confusion once they were back in the control room and watching the camera feed from 494’s cell.

White exhaled impatiently. “He’s in heat, Otto. Once a year the feline DNA in the X5 series acts up and exposes them for the mindless, primitive animals they really are.”

“Oh,” Otto pulled his tie off at last. “So he needs to… uh, mate? To… what… procreate?”

“To _live_.”

Otto nodded, finally getting why White had gestured at Chord, the youngest guard. “And if he doesn’t do it in…”

“In another six hours.”

“Then he dies? We can’t let that happen, the DoD is sending a team of scientists to pick him up tomorrow morning.”

White brushed him off in irritation. The government was nothing more than a tool to be used for the specific purpose of completing _his_ mission, making _his_ people proud. He couldn’t give a rat’s ass what the DoD wanted. But obviously he couldn't tell Otto that.

“Sandeman is our first priority. We’re not just bounty hunters for the DoD anymore. Any luck with the other one?”

Gottlieb shook his head. “Nothing.”

White sighed, his view of Gottlieb’s incompetence hugely evident in that single gush of air, at least he hoped it was.

“But… ” The NSA agent tried again, “in the light of recent developments, think there might be a way to break at least one of them, _and_ keep the X5 intact.”

Ames started to frown but his superhuman brain caught up soon enough. His face split into a villainous smile and he leaned back in his chair.

“Knew there was a reason why I kept you around, Otto.”

***

Alec crouched in the farthest corner of his cell, shaking violently.

Never had he cursed and hated his DNA so much. Back at Manticore, there was always someone else also in heat to hook up with. Even if someone else wasn’t, a relieving vessel was promptly made available to him. In the two years since he got out, willing recipients threw themselves all over him everywhere he turned, heat or not.

This was the first time he’d had to go through it alone. Something he’d always considered a gift – an annual opportunity to have earth-shattering, mind-blowing, absolutely phenomenal sex – was about to bring him nothing but limitless, excruciating, and possibly life-ending pain.

“Your funeral,” White had said. _Funeral pyre_ was more like it.

A terrible agony had been building all day, searing every nerve in his body from the inside out. They’d told him he could die from this thing – his heart couldn’t stand the elevated blood pressures and excessive release of epinephrine after a point. He’d never really believed them, until now.

All he had to do was say the word. The guards had left hours ago but two security cameras continued to track his every move, just waiting for him to give up.

“Fuck you,” he rasped, glaring into a camera, knocking his head back against the bars over and over again.

Max better build him a statue in the center of Terminal City for this. Not only was he about to give up his life for the transgenic cause, he was passing on what was possibly his last chance to have sex in this life!

He toyed with the idea of jacking himself off for a temporary reprieve. But he knew once the floodgates opened, he won’t be able to rein himself back. Good thing Max didn’t trust him with Sandeman’s exact whereabouts after all. She probably knew him better than he knew himself.

The heat was starting to zap him of his energy. Pretty soon he won’t be able to stand on his own two feet, let alone be of any help to the other prisoner stuck here in White’s captivity.

 _Logan._

Just the thought of that man threatened to drive him over the edge. Alec banged his head against the bars hard, welcoming the additional pain for his spectacular failure to protect possibly the most important human in their (his) lives.

Footsteps echoed through the long corridor heading towards him. Alec heard three distinct sets – two in military boots and one barefoot, dragged against its will between the other two men.

Alec sighed. If he had to guess, White was about to dangle some poor bastard in front of him to try and get the X5 to talk. He closed his eyes, resolving to not even look at them.

Someone unlocked the door, which made Alec frown and his heart skipped a beat in pathetic hope. Could they actually be giving him a free ride? A chance to alleviate his agony without asking for something in return?

Someone was shoved into the cage and the door was locked once again. The military boots retreated as fast as they’d approached. A constant litany of _Fuck. Fuck. Fuck_ echoed in his head, until it occurred to him that maybe _that_ word wasn’t the best to chant in this case.

“Alec? You okay?” a soft, pained voice reverberated through the silence. Alec’s eyes flew open and immediately turned towards it.

 _FUCK!!_

“Logan!! What are you…?” He shot up to his feet and tried to retreat, except there was no place left to go. “Oh no, no, no, no…”

His head spun and he couldn’t think straight. His heart rate accelerated to a point where it felt like it would burst.

Logan was resting on his knees and one hand at the other end of the cage, struggling to catch his breath. His other hand was wrapped around his ribs right around where Alec could see a couple of boot prints on Logan’s shirt. They’d taken his exoskeleton, his glasses, jacket, and shoes leaving him in a ripped white (now soiled) button-down and tattered blue jeans. A rivulet of blood had coagulated in place from the left temple down to his smooth square jaw.

“Are you okay?” Logan asked again.

Why the hell was Logan asking _him_ if he was okay? Was Logan okay? He didn’t look okay. Alec wanted to ask, he should have asked, except his tongue was already fighting the tyranny of his melting brain.

 _Not you. Not you. Anyone but you…_

Alec turned his back on Logan, gripped the bars in his fists and didn’t respond. He heard Logan wince as he tried to sit up. “You didn’t tell ‘em anything, did you?”

“I don’t _know_ anything,” Alec huffed, trying his best to block out the enticing scent of Logan flooding his senses.

“Me neither. They don’t believe us, naturally. Good thing they don’t have Manticore’s psych-interrogation technology, huh. It’s why they threw us in here together. They’re watching us, waiting to hear us talk to each other about… stuff.”

Alec wanted to laugh. If only White’s intentions were that simple. He got up and started to pace back and forth like a trapped, furious beast. But he made sure to stay as far away from Logan as possible.

Logan watched him quietly for awhile. “You don’t look so good. What’s going on?”

“Shut up …”

“What? Why?”

“I said just shut up, don’t talk to me!!”

He was really losing it. Logan’s scent, the warmth of his breaths that he could feel all the way over here from all the way over there, the shallow thumping of Logan’s heart ringing in his ears…

“Alec, what’s wrong?” Logan stood up as well and started to approach Alec.

The X5 lunged apart just as Logan’s hand reached for his shoulder. “For once in your life, Logan, listen to me and STAY the FUCK AWAY!!”

Logan backed off like he’d been burnt, which wasn’t so far out of the realm of possibility at this point. Their eyes met – and Alec saw the exact moment in which Logan put two and two together. The rogue cyber-journalist blinked and stepped back and away from Alec, until he hit the opposite corner of the cage.

Alec almost let loose a rapacious smile, the primal part of him relishing that look on Logan’s face. A twelve-by-twelve re-enforced steel cage with an X5… in heat, and Logan was the prey.

“Your timing sucks ass, McDowell.” Logan mumbled. “How long…?”

“Long enough.”

It’d easily been over twelve hours which meant Alec could go into cardiogenic shock any minute. All he had to do was wait it out, long enough to pass out (die) so Logan would be safe, least from _him_.

“It’ll be fine. Max will… any minute now, just hold on, you’ll be fine.”

“Sure, _he_ will be,” a new voice interrupted their conversation. “Not so sure about you, Mr. Cale.”

Alec turned to face White, rage pooling in his eyes and clenched fists. White just smirked and strutted with his hands in his pockets outside the cage.

“I couldn’t contain myself. I just had to come down here and let you boys know how much I’m enjoying your little ‘prisoner’s dilemma’. Game theory was my favorite class in school.”

Logan’s voice took on that famous heroic tone again, one he used for his broadcasts. “Let me guess – if I give you Sandeman, you let me out and throw in that pretty boy behind you, already wetting his pants, into the den with Alec.”

White shrugged. “DoD wants him alive, you on the other hand are expendable, Mr. Cale.”

Logan’s head whipped back towards Alec, who had once again sequestered himself in a corner, sweating profusely. The sound of the two men’s voices was starting to grate on his hypersensitive ears.

“It’s only a matter of time before that monster loses its last shred of humanity and splits you in two.” White prodded crassly. “Last chance. Where. Is. Sandeman?”

Alec watched, mesmerized as Logan bit his lip, quivering nervously. “I don’t know, he doesn’t either.”

Alec shook his head. Even if White believed Logan, he’d never go easy on him – he wouldn’t pass up on this opportunity to hurt the cyber-hero, bring him to his knees, literally.

“Guess you made your bed, Cale,” White hissed with a sinister finality, turned on his heels and left.

“Logan, you idiot…” Alec whispered brokenly, before another wave of nauseating pain swept through his senses. His body screamed at his stupid suicidal brain to do something.

It won’t be long before he’d be screaming on the outside too.

***

Logan didn’t hear White leaving. All his senses were focused on the transgenic in the cage.

“I’m not going to hurt you,” Alec whispered, mostly to himself, his back to Logan once again.

“I know. What can I do to help?”

Alec shook his head, twice, but didn’t respond verbally.

“There must be something. W-Water? Ice?”

“Just… stay where you are, and shut up. Don’t talk. Don’t move. Don’t breathe.”

Logan would have rolled his eyes, but it wasn’t funny. Alec and he might be on the same side, Max’s side, but they couldn’t claim to be friends. Hell, they spent most of their time bickering and butting heads about inane things for no reason. There was a time they might have even hated one another. For all he knew, Alec might hate him still.

Then why was Alec practically killing himself just to protect Logan? Why didn’t he just take what he needed and save himself? Even worse, why was Logan urging his wobbly feet to move, and slowly making his way towards the X5?

“L-Logan, don’t…” Alec warned coldly, angrily.

Logan swallowed but kept moving closer. “You could die…”

“Or I could ride it out, I c-could… j-just stay the fuck away…”

“We can’t take that chance,” Logan said, voice tinged with more fear than the world would ever expect from the mighty Eyes Only.

Before he could change his mind, which he very much wanted to, Logan lowered himself to his knees beside the X5. Part of him hoped that this was all just a vivid nightmare. Any moment now he’d wake up and find himself back in his bed in his recently restored apartment, Max lounging in her favorite chair by his side… smiling and gently murmuring _Morning, sleepyhead._

None of that happened.

At first Alec went deathly still when a hesitant hand landed on the back of his shoulder. Then, he let out a low, guttural moan and spun around to face Logan. In the next instant, he pounced, tackling Logan to the ground on his back.

Logan felt the wind knocked out of him and his head swam. He was barely conscious of what transpired next – of his shirt being torn away from his body, his pants pulled off his ankles, cold, rabid hands everywhere… everywhere they could possibly be. In his hair, pulling his head back, exposing his jugular to two lines of sharp, ravenous teeth. Under his knees, pulling them apart to make space for Alec in between. Around his hips, hoisting them up from the floor and closer to Alec’s unzipped groin.

Logan clenched his eyes shut. He’d made his bed alright. Now he just had to live through it. _If_ he could live through it.

***

It didn’t feel like Alec was in the driving seat either. He watched as his mouth spit into one hand. He watched as two fingers attached to said hand entered Logan, plunging in and stretching him out again and again. Part of him heard the litany of painful grunts but they meant nothing. Every fiber of his being was centered on one incessant, urgent need – to sink into Logan and eject the fiery agony crackling in his veins _out_.

Maybe he hesitated; maybe he elicited a whimper of his own because he didn’t want to hurt Logan, not like this, not in a million years. That’s when a soft hiss broke through his delirium.

“Do it. Please, just get it over with…” the voice trailed off, but Alec obeyed.

He pushed into Logan little by little until he was buried to the hilt inside the warm, tight channel. He closed his eyes and started to move, erratically, insistently, forcefully, until he erupted inside Logan with a gut-wrenching scream. At least he suspected the scream was his and not Logan’s. But it wasn’t over just yet.

Alec stayed sheathed inside Logan for another ten minutes, working himself in and out until he’d found another release. For a split second, the world dissolved into nothing but shades of white. The fire under his skin finally waned and then he was falling forward, like his strings had been slashed, collapsing on top of Logan’s frail form.

Logan stayed still, not like he had much of a choice what with being bracketed under the X5’s deadweight limbs. But with Alec still buried inside him, he couldn’t have borne the torture for too long.

“Alec,” he tried, his voice echoing meekly inside Alec’s head like it was his own. “Alec, please…”

At that, the X5 slapped himself awake. “Jesus,” he cursed softly when he finally separated himself and surveyed the damage he’d done.

Logan lay naked and limp on his back, still favoring his broken ribs which Alec must have inevitably crushed even more. Soon as Alec pulled out, Logan dragged his legs together and curled up on his good side. His eyes were closed, and he was chewing his lower lip raw in an effort to not let any sounds escape his mouth.

“Shh, Logan…” Alec whispered helplessly, and knelt beside the other man.

He re-dressed him as best as he could. The shirt was ruined so he used it as a washcloth, ridding Logan of grime and sweat, the blood on his face… between his legs. Alec felt an iota of relief when he spotted a trickle of come on Logan’s stomach. But he didn’t bring it up because Logan was already having a hard time looking at Alec, and he felt likewise.

A muted sniffle made him freeze and hot tears rushed to his eyes. Alec’s first instinct was to run away, slink over to his dark corner and stay there until help arrived, or White came to finish the job – whoever, he didn’t care anymore. But that would be selfish; it’s what Alec would have done a year ago. But he couldn’t now, not when Logan was so obviously in need of… something, comfort maybe, and there was no one else here but Alec who had to somehow provide it.

“W-would it be okay if…” Alec started, not sure how to go on.

After what felt like a year, Logan looked up at Alec through limpid eyes. If he didn’t want to be touched (by Alec), now was the time to say so.

He didn’t say a word.

Alec pulled an unresponsive Logan up into his arms and held him against the still heaving chest, rocking him back and forth. He stopped dying inside only once minutes later, Logan lifted his arms and clung to Alec’s shoulders, burying his face in Alec’s neck, shuddering in deathly silence.

“You should’ve just given them what they wanted,” Alec whispered right into Logan’s ear, low enough that it couldn’t be picked up by any listening device in the world.

Logan scoffed lightly in response, and Alec shook his head. _Always the frikkin’ hero._

He didn’t know how long he sat like that, cradling Logan in his lap, counting his own heartbeat that was steadily returning to normal. An hour passed, or maybe a decade, didn’t matter. An explosion at the far end of the corridor signaled the arrival of the cavalry. The rest of the night was pretty much a blur.

Alec didn’t let go of Logan, not when Joshua rammed the door down and offered to take him. Not when Logan insisted he could walk. Not even when Max stormed into the brig, sized up the situation instantly and fixed them both with sad, glittering eyes. He felt bad for her, but not enough to let go. Hell, it wasn’t Alec’s fault she couldn’t touch Logan.

Okay, maybe it was. But he’d really rather not talk about it.

He carried Logan out and climbed into a commandeered chopper that took them back to Terminal City. It didn’t occur to him until after he’d laid Logan down on a gurney in the sick bay… that Logan hadn’t once let go of Alec either.

***

“You can’t avoid me forever, you know.”

Alec sighed in response to the kind voice coming up behind him. “I can try.”

He’d been standing at Logan’s full-length window, watching over Seattle one dark, stormy night. Rest of the gang was in the neighboring room strategizing ways to set up a secondary food supply chain into TC. He’d tried his best to get out of it, especially when he realized the meeting had to happen at Logan’s place. But Max wouldn’t let him.

In fact, she’d been cooking up reasons to have him run into Logan all month, knowing very well that was the last thing Alec wanted.

“Please look at me when I’m talking to you?” Logan implored, and not for the first time in the last four weeks, ever since the brig.

Alec considered it for a moment, but then decided against it. “I gotta jet,” he said and headed for the door. But Logan had clearly expected it and was already standing in the way.

“We need to talk.”

“I’ve nothing to say to you.”

“Then just listen.”

Alec huffed and looked every which where except at Logan.

Logan stepped closer, adjusting the glasses on his nose. “I… I just want us to move on. Can’t we try to do that?”

The X5 scowled in disbelief, “I _raped_ you, Logan. Is that really something you can forgive and forget?”

Logan crossed his arms, the mask of nonchalance slipping from his face just for a second, revealing a heartbreaking vulnerability beneath. Alec was taken aback, but for Logan’s sake, he pretended not to have seen it.

“It’s not rape if I consented. And I-I did.”

“Sure you did,” Alec scowled. “Because you always gotta do the right thing, right? Fight the good fight, defend the defenseless, be the fucking hero?”

“You were dying! You could at least pretend to be grateful.”

“You heard White – they wouldn’t have let me die! Remember the pretty boy waiting in the wings?”

Logan glowered darkly. Alec had wanted to piss Logan off, guess he succeeded.

“So you’d be okay if it was that kid instead? Because he’d be a nameless fuck but you have to face me every day? Is that it?”

There were so many things he could tell Logan. Like how he’d resolved to die rather than betray Max or touch someone (anyone) against their will. If Logan had just stayed out of the cell, if it’d been anyone else other than _Logan_ …

But that admission would only make things harder than they already were.

Alec smirked instead. “If you’d seen the look on his face, you’d know it wouldn’t have been rape at all.”

Logan stuttered a bit. “I-I just told you, I consented too.”

Alec shook his head, “You should have left, man. Your stubbornness and stupid martyr complex put us in that position. And you say you’re fine with it but I’m not, okay? I have to live with this all my life!”

All his guilt and self-derision poured out with his outburst, but Alec couldn’t say he felt any better. At least Logan was stunned into silence, and Alec decided to make his escape while it lasted. He reached the door and pulled it open, ready to step out and disappear into the night.

“On a scale of 1 to 10…” Logan called out, making Alec halt, out of curiosity.

He turned to find Logan perched on the edge of the couch, his arms folded protectively against his chest.

“… how bad was it? The sex, I mean.”

 _What the– ?_ “You’re kidding me, right?”

“I just told you – my consent wasn’t the issue. If anything, you’re the one who did _not_ consent to any of it. You’re the one who got forced into it by your own, uh, genetics.”

Alec squinted, he hadn’t thought of it that way.

Logan pursed his lips. “I made a conscious choice, not ‘cause I wanted to be a hero, but because I couldn’t watch you suffer any longer, and because with anyone else it’d be wrong for at least one of you.”

Alec frowned harder, not following.

“If that guy was ordered into the cage against his will, you’d be raping him. And if he really wanted it, as you _claim_ he did, then he’d be using _you_. The Alec I know, at least the Alec you are today, would never take door number one. So, I figured… if someone had to be using you… to save your life… then, i-it might as well be m-me.”

Alec blinked, and watched as Logan’s face turned a curious shade of pink. The bespectacled man swallowed and lowered his gaze to the wooden floor.

“I’m sorry if you’d have preferred him instead. I-I… didn’t, I never considered what you might like and d-dislike…”

Alec blinked again, shock overrunning his ability to speak. Was Logan blushing? Did he just… did he just tell Alec what Alec thought he did…?

***

Logan wanted to kick himself. Why couldn’t he just keep his mouth shut? He’d been living with these unrequited feelings for a year now. And while they weren’t exactly friends, he and Alec had developed a working relationship that worked. So why did he have to go and rock the fucking boat?

Hell, he knew exactly why – because he’d had a taste of what it could be like. Even it was far from perfect and in the worst circumstances possible, Logan had had the chance to be touched by Alec in a way he’d never ever thought possible outside his dreams.

The silence stretched longer and he hugged himself harder, not looking up at Alec at all.

“Two,” Alec said, out of the blue, making Logan jump.

“What?”

“On a scale of one to ten, it was a two.”

Logan couldn’t help but pout and quickly looked away but it was too late. Alec chuckled and ambled over to sit beside him on the couch.

“Truth is, I can’t remember most of what happened, and because it got over way too soon… for me, I mean – i-it probably felt like an eternity to you. Sorry.” Alec rambled nervously, it made Logan smile.

“Do you remember the… things you said?”

“I was delirious, was blabbering nonsense. Please just forget it?”

“Why would I want to? You said the _sweetest_ things,” Logan teased, reveling in Alec’s discomfort just a little.

Alec wringed his hands and glared at him anxiously, making Logan duck his head again. A strange brand of shyness that Logan had never felt before made it harder for him to speak.

“Don’t worry. You just kept saying… how sorry you were, over and over and _over_ again, and how you’d wanted to… do this for so long, but that this wasn’t how you’d pictured our first time to be…”

Alec’s breath hitched in his throat and he got to his feet hastily. Logan glanced up at that gorgeous perfection of a man, even when he strongly resembled a deer caught in headlights of a racing Hummer. His mystic green eyes were blown wide open and fixed right at Logan.

There were so many things he could tell Alec. Like how the X5 had placed a hand under Logan’s head before pushing him to the ground so Logan wouldn’t get concussed. Or how Alec had spent an inordinate amount of time preparing Logan despite the urgency he must have felt. Or the way one hand caressed Logan’s skin wherever it could reach while his lips made soft shushing sounds to calm the brunet’s nerves.

He most definitely didn’t know how he’d describe Alec generously stoking Logan’s erection throughout, causing an overload of pleasure that completely overwhelmed everything else – pain, fear, helplessness, the cold dank floor beneath. Alec had managed to whisk him off to a different time and place altogether – a place where they weren’t being forced upon each other, where they were making love because they _wanted_ to.

Someday, maybe… he’d find the words to let Alec know how much he’d appreciated his restraint. Someday, Alec might tell him it wasn’t restraint but love. But for now, this would have to be enough:

“Granted it wasn’t the best setting for two people to come together, and as weird as this might seem… Alec, I…” Logan wheezed and looked away again, suddenly feeling very lonely. “I just… I thought it was more than a two, that’s all.” He ended abruptly, foolishly.

And then he shut up.

A loud argument erupted in the neighboring room. Original Cindi was giving Mole a piece of her mind and Joshua was trying to mediate. Logan could hear Max laughing in the background. He pictured her lounging in his old wheelchair, spinning in it round and round to keep herself entertained.

He’d loved her. And a part of him always will.

Alec turned towards the sounds too, possibly thinking of the same person – the one who brought them together in the first place.

“Will Max understand?” he wondered aloud.

“I think she already does.”

Alec bit his lip, then sat beside Logan on the couch again. The journalist braced himself and turned to face the X5, wondering if he was about to be gently let down, or maybe socked in the face.

“I lied. It was a four.”

Logan smiled, daring to hope. “I’ll take it.”

“If you ever wanna know what a ten looks like…”

Their eyes met, and Logan couldn’t help but blush, “I’d love to.”

Alec grinned so happily, no way in hell could it not be infectious.

“Of course, you can’t just get to a ten straight off the bat. My experience with normal people tells me it usually involves stuff like getting to know each other first, over like… contraband champagne and chicken and movies and stuff.”

Logan liked the sound of that. “Wait, what do you know about movies?”

Alec hiked an eyebrow. “I’ve been told I look like some guy called James Dean.”

“I wouldn’t go that far.”

“Matt Damon then?”

“You wish.”

Alec laughed heartily, and Logan mentally cheered. The transgenic reached for Logan’s hand, waiting for the human to extend it himself. Logan allowed their fingers to intertwine, squeezing back to let Alec know the touch was more than welcome.

“So, you really thought it was more than two, huh?” Alec asked, eyes twinkling with mischief.

Logan pretended to think and shrugged. “More like a three.”

“WHAT? But… I thought… never mind,” the X5 sulked adorably. Logan couldn’t help but laugh at the flabbergasted expression on his face.

“Well, maybe if you’d kissed me…”

Alec pulled him closer until they were nestled in each other’s arms. “I can fix that now.”

Logan closed his eyes and surrendered to the perfect storm of sensations once again.

He made a mental note to thank White next time they ran into him, just before stepping aside and letting Max rip his fucking heart out.

*** THE END ***

A/N: Let me know what you think?


End file.
